Blake enters world in van on Northway

Matthew Hamilto, Times Union

By Matthew Hamilton

Updated 8:36 pm, Friday, October 11, 2013

Julie and Jeremiah TenEyck, sit with their newborn son, Blake, at their home in Ballston Spa Friday, Oct. 11, 2013. Blake was born in the family minivan early Wednesday morning as Jeremiah TenEyck drove his wife toward Glens Falls Hospital.
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Blake TenEyck may be a fourth child, but his birth still marked a first.

Blake was born in the family minivan as Jeremiah TenEyck drove his wife, Julie TenEyck, up the Northway just after midnight Wednesday. Friday Blake made his way home to Ballston Spa, this time without the frenzied drive of two nights before.

Julie TenEyck said she visited her doctor Tuesday, when she had been having off-and-on contractions throughout the day. But she wasn't due until Oct. 24 and the contractions hadn't been consistent or intense.

"I was waiting for my contractions to intensify. This was my fourth child, it's not like I didn't know what to look for," she said.

At 1 a.m. Wednesday, the wait was over.

The mother said she called her doctor because the pain was intense enough to make her nauseous, but she still wasn't sure driving to Glens Falls Hospital was in order because the contractions weren't consistent. Nonetheless, she and her husband packed up and headed out in the minivan.

At Northway Exit 13, Julie TenEyck's water broke, prompting a call from Jeremiah to the doctor to give an update on his wife's condition. By Exit 16, he was calling 911.

Julie TenEyck said it was at the rest area just before Exit 17 that Blake was on his way.

"I thought we would make it," Jeremiah TenEyck said, adding he knew his wife has quick labors. "I guess I was shocked at first. Then I just kind of went into a I had to get done what I had to do mode."

Jeremiah TenEyck pulled over as Blake was being born. Once the baby was out, the parents said the dispatcher still on the phone with the father walked them through tying off the umbilical cord and cleaning out Blake's airway so he could breath. The couple also wrapped their newborn in his father's sweater to keep warm.

It wasn't the first time Jeremiah TenEyck has been there as his wife gave birth, something he said helped his nerves.

"You would think I would be (nervous), but it felt like second nature," he said. "I wasn't nervous at all for that. I felt like everything was clicking, like it was something I did every day, but it wasn't."

Eager to move before his wife delivered the placenta, Jeremiah TenEyck started driving again before the dispatcher quickly told him to stop. Five minutes later — an eternity, the father said — a Moreau Emergency Squad ambulance arrived to end the chaotic drive in the minivan and take Blake and his mother the rest of the way from around Exit 18 to the hospital.

Blake isn't the first baby born on the Northway this year. In August, a State Trooper helped through part of the delivery of a baby girl south of the Twin Bridges.

On Friday afternoon, both Jeremiah and Julie TenEyck said from home that their newborn son was doing just fine.